


Fifth Form

by Crait



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), IX What IX, Post-Canon, Slice of Life, Sparring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-23
Updated: 2019-12-23
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:18:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21919660
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crait/pseuds/Crait
Summary: Lightsabers: a love story.
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 11
Kudos: 39





	Fifth Form

**Author's Note:**

> Trying to figure out how to write Ben Solo's voice: take one.

Rey was starting to get crabby. That wasn't actually all that unusual; she tackled the world with a blend of enthusiasm, acceptance, and cranky determination that got results if nothing else. Ben wasn't sure how he'd ended up in a relationship where he was the less impulsive and less stubborn partner at least most of the time, but she did have a quick temper. 'Cross' was maybe a better word. He adored her.

"I don't understand why you can strike faster," she said, crossly. "I'm quicker than you are."

"But I'm stronger," Ben pointed out. They were sparring about fifty feet from the Falcon. The hanger bay was enormous and open to the sky and birds kept flying overhead and trying to land on the ship even though the ship wasn't a roost. Any minute one of them was going to land on the wrong part, and then the wrong part was going to fall off. 

"What does that have to do with anything? You're nearly a Wookiee, of course you're stronger." The tip of her blue blade dipped, and her scowl deepened accordingly when she realized he was smiling at her. "This is going to be one of those 'I'm not a Jedi but' moments, isn't it."

"Do your texts say anything about lightsabers?"

The scowl lifted a little. "Not much," she admitted. "Or at least not that I've read." Most of her reading, both of the old Jedi manuscripts and of the teachings of the Church of the Force, was focused on philosophies regarding the Force itself. Choosing what from the past to carry forward into the new Jedi order she was building had to be draining enough without learning a lot of obscure details about lightsaber combat.

"There's a couple of things going on. The first is that your lightsaber's too heavy for you." He shut off his own saber and crossed over to her. A long time ago, Ben had told her she needed a teacher; he hadn't ever really expected to serve in that capacity himself, but somehow he found himself in the roles of both instructor and student. And cook—keeping her fed was like trying to feed a bantha.

"The only weight is the hilt," Rey said.

"But when you turn it on, it resists being moved." He came up behind her and put his hand over hers, dwarfing it. The hilt was too big for her, too, but they'd get to that, and he'd probably end up conceding that using an oversized lightsaber wasn't _significantly_ crippling her. "See?" He used their joined hands to swing laterally and couldn't stop himself from smiling again when he sensed her usual pleased satisfaction at having him touch her. "That's the gyroscopic effect from the plasma loop. It doesn't want to change direction."

"And the hilt's too big," she said.

"And the hilt's too big. It's strange when you do that."

"You're strange," Rey said, unphased by her own tendency to pull entire thoughts out of his head. "What do you mean, about the hilt?"

"My grandfather was bigger than you, too, and he built this lightsaber. Of course, he was also bigger than Uncle Luke, and that ended up… uh, maybe not 'fine,' but it didn't hold him back." Or at least it hadn't impacted how Luke constructed his second lightsaber. Ben had trained with that one when he was a kid, and it hadn't been that much smaller than the one Rey held now. He wondered what had happened to it. Maybe Luke had tossed it in the ocean at Ahch-To with his X-wing. All that remorse, and no one around to see it; his family was just as devoted to extremes in private as they were in public. 

Rey leaned back against him and moved their hands in a figure eight. "Let me see yours," she said, and Ben shut down her saber and replaced it with his own. 

"Anything else I can do for you?" he asked, and then made an exaggerated wince when Rey elbowed him lightly in the ribs. 

"Hush," she said. "You're supposed to be nice to me when you're teaching me."

"You aren't nice to _me,"_ he teased.

"I'm always nice to you," Rey said, which was an absolute truth. She flipped the ignition, and his lightsaber crackled to life in her hand. The red was slowly bleeding out of it as the kyber healed, but he doubted he'd ever be able to rid himself of the vents. That was all right; they came in handy. It never hurt to be able to stab in three directions.

She tried the figure-eight again now that she knew what she was feeling, and then a quick, flashy series of cuts. "This one's even heavier," she said. "I knew, but I hadn't really paid attention to it before. I see what you mean—if you don't have the strength to change direction quickly, you'll never be as fast."

"Uncle Luke built my mom a lightsaber that she never used. It's probably buried on the Falcon somewhere. Maybe we can dig it up so you can try it—she was smaller than you, but you'll get an idea of the difference the size of the blade can make." 

"I always thought Darth Vader was short," Rey admitted. "What? Your mother and uncle weren't tall, I assumed you got your height from Han. Stop laughing at me. Ben. Ben, stop laughing." She tilted her head back against his chest to stare up at him, and nothing about her expression suggested she was anything but amused by his amusement. "I'm going to go find another apprentice if you keep this up."

"I'm not an apprentice," he said, and threaded an arm around her waist just to make sure she really got the point. "Definitely not your apprentice." He was absolutely her apprentice. He was whatever she wanted him to be. 

"According to you, you're not a Jedi, either," she retorted. It was an argument that was already easy and old after only three months. 

"In that case," he said, like he was going to drop the lesson and leave. Rey saw right through him; she didn't even shift her weight in case he jokingly stepped away, because they both knew he wasn't going anywhere. "If I was a Jedi—"

"Which you're not."

"—Which I'm not, I would tell that using Djem So isn't doing you any favors, either." 

"What's that? Is it one of the lightsaber forms?"

"Fifth form," Ben said. "The idea is that the best defense is a good offense."

The problem was that their styles were so completely tangled they had to work hard to separate them. Ben's formal schooling had been mostly in Djem So, but he was capable in Soresu, competent enough in Ataru, and had probably veered close to Juyo during those long, despairing years under Snoke's heel. Rey's grounding was far more eclectic and fundamentally pretty close to street fighting, although Han Solo's son wasn't exactly unfamiliar with the concept of the sneak attack. 

"That doesn't have anything to do with my size, though." 

"No, but it does mean you instinctively try strikes that aren't as effective for you." Those big overhand blows, for one.

"I don't know how to stop drawing on it," she admitted. "On what you know, I mean, or how you'd react."

He snorted. "Imagine how I felt when a scavenger who had never held a lightsaber before fought me to a standstill."

"I won that fight!"

"That's not how I remember it."

"You know, if you're joking about the time you stabbed Finn in the back and then tried to push me off a cliff—no, Ben, don't. It's all right."

At least one of them thought so. He cleared his throat. "We need to figure out a way to work around it." Their bond was… 'useful' was too utilitarian a word for something that was necessary and beautiful, but it did have occasional drawbacks.

"Short of kicking you out of my head, I don't have any ideas, and we both know I'm not going to do that," Rey said. 

"You could focus on another form, though. That might give you the muscle memory you need. I know a little bit about Forms Three and Four. Three's defensive. Grounded. Four is like Djem So—offensive, but with more speed and agility."

"I like that one," Rey said.

"I never would've guessed," he said, and then he patted her hip. "Let's take a break—"

"No."

"And then we can figure it out together."

"No, I want to figure it out now."

"You have to be hungry."

"Well," Rey said, "maybe a break wouldn't be the worst thing."


End file.
